Sat 18 Aug 2018
Archived PI Mystery Review: DAVID EVERSON – Rebound.
Posted by Steve under Bibliographies, Lists & Checklists , Characters , Reviews[6] Comments
DAVID EVERSON – Rebound. Robert Miles #2. Ivy, paperback original; 1st printing, September 1988.
While Robert Miles is a PI (Mid-Continental Op and Associates), his specialty is political intelligence. Of course you realize that this is as much a contradiction in terms as “student athlete.” which is what this story is all about: an impending basketball scandal.
Lincoln Heritage University is also where Miles’s wife (separated but amicably so) happens to work. All this background is interesting, but except on occasions mow and then, this is merely adequate PI fare. What Everson has to do is to make it both leaner and meaner.
The Robert Miles series —
Recount (1987)
Rebound (1988)
Instant Replay (1989)
Rematch (1989)
A Capital Killing (1990)
Suicide Squeeze (1991)
False Profits (1992)
Short stories:
“Catnap” (1991, Cat Crimes)
“Operation: Trojan Horse” (1991, Solved)
August 18th, 2018 at 8:47 pm
Another PI series that seems to have come and gone without a lot of notice. I wish I could tell you more about this one, but while I do remember reading it, what I said in the review is all that’s really coming back to me.
August 19th, 2018 at 6:34 pm
Sounds like he tossed a good idea, a PI dealing in “political intelligence” off in favor of too standard fare. I wonder if later books dealt with the hero’s specialty.
August 19th, 2018 at 7:16 pm
I wish I knew, but I can’t tell you. This is the only one in the series that I’ve ever read.
August 19th, 2018 at 8:25 pm
From the Thrilling Detective website:
“My name is ROBERT MILES and I’m a private eye with a difference. My mean streets are the corridors of power in the Illinois capitol. Call what I do for the Speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives opposition research.”
Whatever you call it, author David Everson’s political savvy makes for some eye-opening detective fiction. And Miles himself is a likable guy, a former minor league ball player turned slacker private eye with a healthy disregard for the entire political process he serves, and a taste for fast-food and bad puns.
His first two novels, Recount and Rebound, were both nominated for Shamus awards.
August 19th, 2018 at 8:28 pm
A plot summary of REMATCH:
“When a member of a radical right wing group wins the candidacy for Illinois governor, P.I. Robert Miles needs to get inside the neo-fascist organization to get answers. But the machinations in the Illinois political sweepstakes have just become deadly.”
August 20th, 2018 at 12:15 am
Thanks, that answers that.